


the common tongue of you loving me

by vampiresuffrage



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, its true love theyre in LOVE!!!, other characters are mentioned but these 3 are the only actually featured ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-24
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2020-10-27 17:42:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20764370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vampiresuffrage/pseuds/vampiresuffrage
Summary: Humans and monsters alike feel many types of love, and feel each type of love in even more infinitely varied ways. Arum, Damien, and Rilla may show their love in different ways, but all three of them love wholly and unconditionally.Or: A look at Arum, Damien, and Rilla's love languages.





	the common tongue of you loving me

**Author's Note:**

> strap in for some sappy bs! title from moment's silence by hozier because god that's a good fucking line
> 
> ao3 and tumblr user maikuria is the light of my life and the main thing that motivated me to get this done so thank you ria ily

It wasn't hard to tell how Damien preferred to show his love when he let his heart spill from his lips with every smile Rilla directed his way. He could (and did) write sonnets (and odes and soliloquies and ballads and once an epic) about the way her calloused hands held his face when she kissed him and the way her laugh could halt armies and the way she was the most radiant being he'd ever encountered. Damien loved so _ wholly _ that he could see no way to keep silent about it, so he didn't. He showered her with words of adoration whenever the chance arose, and the way her eyes twinkled, the way she kissed him breathless for it meant he scarcely felt a shred of fear when he did.

He could love Rilla freely and openly, could tell her so every day, and never run out of reverent and loving words to gift her.

When he met Arum, when he looked into Arum's beautiful, intelligent, scheming, almost-human _ violet _ eyes, he had just as many words, just as strong a compulsion to let his heart's desires flow freely.

He couldn't though, of course not. The very_ desire _ to do so constituted a betrayal of the highest order, both to Rilla and to his Citadel. So instead he cried out in rambling epithets, vague and untraceable to the monster that occupied more of his thoughts with each passing day. It was worse, far worse, when Arum _had Rilla_, because some traitorous part of him still _dreamt_ of those violet eyes even as Damien hunted the lizard that stole away the love of his life.

But then...well, then Rilla was safe, and she knew. And she said it was okay, and Damien's heart sang in sweet, piercing relief just as soon as it sunk in that _ he could have them both_, and they both wanted him in turn_. _

After that, he could speak as freely as he so pleased of his affections for Lord Arum--the way those violet eyes seemed to pierce his very soul and the way his bared teeth felt now more of an invitation than a challenge and the way that his frill unfurled every time Rilla or Damien paid him a compliment even as he denied being flustered by them.

He had to watch his words carefully within the confines of the Citadel of course, when not speaking to Sir Angelo (or occasionally, eventually, Sir Caroline when she stopped scoffing in disgust at his treason), for it wouldn't do to mention within earshot of those who would see him Exiled or worse that his lily had four arms and scales and favored magic over science, that half of his heart belonged to a monster.

Within the Citadel's walls, he spoke of his forever flower with her ringing laugh and her strong arms and her ramblings of science, and his lily with his cunning mind and his skilled blades and his smiles that were reserved only for Damien and Rilla. There were still every so often looks directed his way as he belted tales of his two loves, but nobody would accuse him of betraying his Citadel for it, and once Rilla heard the whispers about him, nobody would any longer accuse him of betraying his fiance. 

He was told by Sir Angelo (and eventually Talfryn, once he told his brother he had abandoned his dreams of knighthood and began training under Rilla to learn the skill of medicine) that he never looked so happy as when he did so. He didn’t doubt their words--if his face showed even a fraction of the love he felt all the way in his very _ soul_, then he was sure he must radiate with the joy in his heart if he so much as spoke the names of his loves.

Rilla showed her love more quietly, but no less clearly. 

Her love was shown in too-tight hugs when Damien got back from a mission, in kisses on every inch of skin she could reach when they were alone, in holding his hand or linking their arms every time they walked somewhere together. She showed her love through bandaging Damien’s wounds, through reminding him of any meetings or obligations he would’ve otherwise forgotten, through massaging the stiffness from his shoulders after a particularly demanding day. 

Rilla would never be heard shouting her love for a crowd (until she was, until she thought it might save Arum), but it was impossible for anyone to deny her love for Damien if they saw how tenderly she tended to his wounds or how her face lit up when he reached out to hold her hand or how she poured everything she was into every kiss. 

She loved him completely, and even if she didn’t have the endless and beautiful words that he did, she showed him every day. 

Arum was not, at first, as easy to love. Rilla did not _ want _ to help him, did not want to touch him, did not want to do anything for him besides what it took to get her home. 

Until the day came that she _ did _ want to do all those things. Until the day came that she found herself wishing she could change how lonely Arum clearly was, until she found herself genuinely sharing in Arum’s joy that she was able to help save his Keep, until she reached for one of his hands when they said their goodbyes and felt the absence down to her very bones until she next saw him. 

She wasn’t lying when she told the monster court she’d thought about kissing Arum. She’d thought about it non-stop, about how to tell Damien and how to tell Arum and whether Arum would even _ enjoy _ kissing as humans did and--well, she’d thought plenty about it. 

When they were _ finally _ back together in Arum’s swamp, in the confines of his Keep, when Damien agreed to stay, when he kissed Arum and Arum _ purred_, Rilla’s heart soared. She showed both of them, openly and with abandon, all of the love in her heart. 

She kissed them both every chance she got (Arum was decidedly a fan of kissing once they worked out the right way to do it), she made sure Arum’s cloak was always clean before he went out, she sang to them when they were upset, she laid her head on the shoulder of whichever of them was closer when the opportunity presented itself. She went to sleep sandwiched between the two of them every night, woke up every morning feeling more complete than she’d ever thought possible, kissed them both awake just to see them smile sleepily at her and hold her tighter. 

Rilla was a doctor. She worked with her hands, with what she could see and touch. She loved much the same. Her love was shown in her hands and the little things she did to help Damien and Arum, in what she could give to them and do for them, in how tightly she could hold them and how softly she could kiss them. 

Arum showed his love neither loudly nor boldly when he had the choice (a public declaration for Amaryllis, a challenge to keep Damien there--both were desperate measures, and Arum wasn't one for such desperation in better circumstances).

Arum's love was shown every time he asked Damien if he wanted to do some target practice together, every time he invited Amaryllis to watch him experiment, every time he sat quietly and listened to Damien try and work through the structure of his next poem and every time he let Amaryllis ramble on about her human science.

Arum loved by being present. He knew what it was to be lonely, and his love was in not allowing Damien and Amaryllis to feel the same. 

When Arum met Damien, a foolish human knight and a _ poet_, he felt no fondness for the man. When Damien was foolish enough to let him live, and even moreso to challenge him to a rematch, his heart certainly did not flutter. Of course not. Such things were for humans and for children, and _ not _for Arum.

The Keep made jokes at his expense the entire time he prepared for their next duel. The Keep was incorrect in all its judgements--Arum was preparing so thoroughly because he wanted to assure the knight's death, _ not _ because of...anything else.

And then he didn't kill him. He called him honeysuckle, got close enough to feel the knight's fragile heart pounding, bandaged his wound, challenged him to a third duel under the guise of fairness. Arum did not want to kill the knight. No, he wanted to see him again. He wanted to hear his prattling about poetry and his heart, wanted to be challenged by him once again, wanted to see his knight's face blush when Arum called him honeysuckle and feel his shaking breath when Arum got close. 

He ignored the Keep's gloating and prepared to see him again. 

Then Amaryllis...well, then Amaryllis. Insufferable, curious _ scientist_. Obsessed with surety and consistency and easily replicable results, making progress at a snail's pace.

Amaryllis, bold enough to challenge him and test his patience in new ways every day despite knowing her fate rested in his claws (what she didn't know: he couldn't even kill the knight who had held a sword to his throat, so he certainly didn't plan to kill the unarmed herbalist even at her most stubborn). 

She cured the Keep's blight, in the end. Arum found that he..._wanted _ her to stay. It was no longer just a matter of necessity. The human herbalist who challenged him in a way nobody ever had before, who had saved his Keep (saved him), who had a fiance and a family. He let her go because he desperately wanted her to stay. 

He let the both of them go. Damien by not going to their third duel (and he certainly _ could _ have waited until afterwards to take Amaryllis, but the way his heart pounded when he thought of his honeysuckle made him cowardly), Amaryllis by allowing her to go home (he could have kept her, she _ expected _ him to, but keeping her caged with him felt _ wrong _ after realizing his feelings, when he knew she would be far happier away from him). He may regret having not allowed himself to care for them, but he didn't regret their freedom. 

But then they both found their way back to him. It wasn't the reunion that Arum had thought of while he tossed and turned, unable to sleep away from his Keep, awaiting his trial. _ Honestly_, it hardly could've gone worse than it did. 

But they did find him, and Damien seemed much less keen to kill him once Arum's fear monster was dead. They went back to the swamp, and they stayed. With him. Completely willingly. They _ wanted to be around him _just as much as he ached to be around them. 

Hardly a day passed after that that wasn't spent with one or both of them. Amaryllis still loved her science, but she eagerly accepted his invitations to watch him perform magic. Damien loved to read aloud, and especially for an audience, and Arum was more than willing to listen even when the stories were painfully boring because Damien lit up when he read, and Arum savored those afternoons spent with his knight absolutely enraptured in some poem or novel.

Arum, who had felt loneliness sharply through his life (even though he would never admit it), saw no better way to show his love than to make sure his loves were never alone. Arum loved in invitations to share meals, in asking for assistance on projects he could do with three arms tied behind his back, in sharing his space with Damien and Rilla even when they just silently coexisted. Arum's love was not bold, nor was it loud, but it was steady and warm and undeniable.

Humans and monsters alike feel many types of love, and feel each type of love in even more infinitely varied ways. Damien in poems and ramblings, Rilla in warm touches and a steady hand, Arum in time spent always together. All with their entire hearts, and all without reservation.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr @chadarum!


End file.
